The 10-kilometer mountain bike rally promoted by Nepal Tourism Board was the first event to take place Thursday in a chain of events organized to celebrate the 28th World Tourism Day.
The event was organized by Nepal Mountain Bike Tours Pvt. Ltd in collaboration with Buddha Air, Yeti Air, Real Beauty Point, President Travel and Tours, Dwarika's Hotel, Hyatt Regency Hotels, Kilroys Restaurant and Bar and Bungy Nepal.
According to the organizers, Ranjan Rajbhandari and Sudeep Poudel, a total of seventy participants including world-renowned cyclist Pushkar Shah took part in the rally.
"Even though the theme for this year's World Tourism Day is 'Tourism Opens Doors to Women', only four females took part in the event," said Rajbhandari.
The rally began at 7 am and the participants cycled from NTB to Chhetrapati via Maitighar junction, Tripureshwor, New Road and back to NTB via Tridevi Marg in forty minutes.
Puskar Shah who has already traveled to 114 countries and a total of 390,000 kilometers around the world in his bicycle stated that his sole intention to cycle around the world was to spread the message of peace. "Nepal still has a long way to go and we should do everything possible to help peace prevail in our nation," he said.
Meanwhile, RSS adds from Chitwan, tourism entrepreneurs are greatly concerned over a sharp decline in number of tourists visiting Sauraha of Chitwan on the World Tourism Day.
According to Tourism entrepreneurs, tourist season starts in Sauraha from August and September.
Around 200 tourists visited Sauraha at this time in previous years, while this year only 30 tourists visited the place.
According to chairman of the regional hotel association, Sauraha, Haribhakta Ghimire, there was no such a sharp decline in tourist arrivals even at the time of crisis in previous years.
This year saw lowest number of tourists, he said.
Many hotels in Sauraha have remained vacant because of such situation. According to Ghimire, bomb blast in Kathmandu, the recent incident in Kapilbastu and tension in Terai region have contributed to this situation.
Only Indian tourists can be seen these days. |
